While Ukrainians are welcomed to the UK, asylum seekers of colour are deported, like 160,000 Irish were deported to Australia between 1788 and 1868.
Colonialist crimes and atrocities are always with us. Rulers stamped their cruel laws and vices on occupied and exploited nations, while the victims have suffered a loss of identity. Cultural and moral values have been corrupted by the vices of the former colonial rulers and occupiers.
In the Philippines, a massive sex industry was created by around American military bases during colonial occupation, with corrupt Filipino collaborators exploiting their own people.
On a recent tour of atonement to the Democratic Republic of the Congo [DRC], King Philippe of Belgium expressed regret for the brutal colonial period when it was known as the Belgian Congo, which saw millions of Congolese die in slavery in their own land. Continued violence and exploitation of the people by armed groups fighting over mineral wealth is the legacy there.
The king made a special visit to a humble gynecologist, Nobel Laureate, Doctor Denis Mukwege, awarded for his campaign to stop sexual violence and rape as a weapon of war. Mukwege and the DRC accused Rwanda of backing the rebel group M23. Rwanda has denied the allegations though its human rights record is questionable.
The UK is the destination of many fleeing war and escaping the threat of death from tyrants. The government of Boris Johnson wants to stop them and more from coming, as do Belgium, France, Italy, and The Netherlands
Philippe expressed regret for the colonial “paternalism, discrimination and racism” that led “to abuse and humiliation.” He fell short of offering a full apology, however.
Over a million people have fled violence and war and live as refugees in camps in Turkey and Jordan. They fled Syria with their wives and children to escape the indiscriminate bombing and chemical attacks by the Hafez al-Assad, who is backed by Russia. Others flee assassins, execution squads, extortionists and criminal gangs.
Western nations have to take responsibility for their own involvement in causing or aiding some of these conflicts, through the arming of Saudi Arabia, proxy attacks on Yemen and the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
The UK is the destination of many fleeing war and escaping the threat of death from tyrants. The government of Boris Johnson wants to stop them and more from coming, as do Belgium, France, Italy, and The Netherlands. These nations have influential right wing, racist groups opposed to asylum seekers and refugees of a different faith profession and skin colour.
As we celebrate the 500 years of Christianity in the Philippines. The Chaplaincy to Filipino Migrants organises an on-line talk every Tuesday at 9.00pm. You can join us at:
https://www.Facebook.com/CFM-Gifted-to-give-101039001847033
Britain, led by the bumbling Boris Johnson, having left the European Union to supposedly regain its sovereignty and deal with undocumented immigration and asylum seekers is now floundering in economic meltdown.
Over a million people have fled violence and war and live as refugees in camps in Turkey and Jordan. They fled Syria with their wives and children to escape the indiscriminate bombing and chemical attacks by the Hafez al-Assad, who is backed by Russia. Others flee assassins, execution squads, extortionists and criminal gangs.
Johnson is trying to unilaterally change the Northern Ireland Protocol, which the UK itself approved. Doing so will violate international law and surely lead to the cancellation of the vital trade agreement with the EU.
If possible, he would rid the UK of Filipino health care workers but Johnson dares not as it has too few of its own. In a few years, the Scots might be barred from Britain if Scotland succeeds in winning its independence from Britain, ending a thousand years of colonial rule.
An independent Scotland could conceivably join the European Union, as Northern Ireland will eventually join the Republic of Ireland as it is already under the EU’s single market. They will realise that must leave the sinking ship of broken and racist British governments.
However, Britain has opened its welcoming arms to more than 60,000 Ukrainian refugees in the past few months. They are fleeing Russian aggression and have been given immediate, privileged refugee status and welcomed into UK family homes. They are white, Christian, and Western-educated.
Recently, treated like convicts and bundled onto a chartered plane costing US$500,000 [$3.9 million] a trip, to be deported to Rwanda in Africa, where their claims would supposedly be processed
However, to the eternal shame and disgrace of Britain, those asylum seekers and refugee of a stripe and hue who are also fleeing similar bombings in Syria and the other oppressive regimes, have no British family waiting for them. They are arrested as they land on the beaches and held in immigration prisons.
For the British government, the Ukrainian refugees are the right kind and the others are not. However, if they are repatriated to their countries of origin, they are likely to be jailed, tortured, or killed, but the UK is determined to deport them without asylum hearings, as is their right under international law.
Recently, treated like convicts and bundled onto a chartered plane costing US$500,000 [$3.9 million] a trip, to be deported to Rwanda in Africa, where their claims would supposedly be processed. The UK government had signed a deal with Rwanda with a US$150,000 [$1.1 million] down payment to accept these suffering human beings who are treated like garbage being shipped abroad.
However, the first flight was cancelled when the European Court of Human Rights deemed the action illegal through successful legal action by their defenders [Sunday Examiner, June 26]. But more will come.
The policy is un-Christian, hard-hearted, cruel, harsh unjust punishment, devoid of justice and compassion. The Church of England and Wales and most UK charities and non-government organisations stand against it
The policy is un-Christian, hard-hearted, cruel, harsh unjust punishment, devoid of justice and compassion. The Church of England and Wales and most UK charities and non-government organisations stand against it.
This British government’s inhuman policy, supported by 44 per cent and opposed by 40 per cent of those surveyed in a YouGov poll, is not new. It was common practice for the British in an occupied, colonial Ireland suffering from famine and starvation.
From 1791 to 1867, a period of 76 years, the British tore Irish men and women from their families and communities, convicted them as criminals for petty offenses, and transported them to Australia.
An estimated 20 per cent of the Australian population is descended from convicts. While only 10 per cent admit they are of Irish descent.
While Britain convicted the Irish for stealing a loaf of bread and exiled them to Australia, it stole a whole continent from the Aboriginal people. That was no small crime. It appears racism continues today in Australia as in Britain.
Aboriginal Australians make up 28 per cent of the adult prisoners in Australian jails but they are only three per cent of the entire population. Up to 68 per cent of juveniles in detention are aboriginal.
The new British destination today for unwanted, dark-skinned asylum seekers of a different religion is Rwanda, a land from which no asylum seeker, like the Irish sent to Australia, can ever return.
Father Shay Cullen
www.preda.org.
